


Sunrise Brew

by smalldisasters



Category: South Park
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, College, Craig POV, Drug Use, Drug Withdrawal, M/M, Meth Tweek, Non-Consensual Drug Use, first person POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-18
Packaged: 2019-03-19 01:22:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 14,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13693935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smalldisasters/pseuds/smalldisasters
Summary: Tweek had been fine leaving South Park.I had silently stressed about how much he was going to freak out with the move, with the new surroundings, being away from his parents, but he’d surprised us all with being absolutely fine. Until he ran out of his favourite Sunrise Brew coffee.Tweek had been fine, but nothing lasts.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Yikes! My first multi-chapter since I was on ff.net. Wild. Enjoy!

When we had been seventeen, we had to get real.

We’d had all these fanciful conversations over the years, laying on my blue bedsheets underneath the constellations of glowing green stars we’d spent hours meticulously sticking to the ceiling when we were twelve years old. We talked about living together forever, running away somewhere hot or somewhere busy like Barcelona or California, but we talked in the same way I talked about going to space, and Tweek talked about being stable. Pipe dreams of little boys in a childish love. When we were that age, we called each other ‘babe’ and ‘honey’, and we held hands while we walked. Maybe nothing had changed that much, we were still openly affectionate, although we didn’t kiss or hold hands at school any more. Too many older kids we didn’t know when we went to high school scared us out of that. But our relationship never became a secret we had to hide. But we had to be realistic when we grew up. Ideas of living together in a domestic bliss seemed as solid as clouds.

But Tweek never had any intention of going to college. He’d adamantly insisted on that since he was fifteen.

“No way, man,” he’d said, shaking his head violently. “When I finish here I’m getting out of school, and never looking back.”

He said the same thing about South Park. _Never looking back._ That’s what we said. We were getting out of there and never looking back.

Funny how many kids said that in this town.

We’d had conversations with the guidance counsellors and the teachers and the parents and every goddamn adult we knew about our futures. They all said the same thing.

“I know you love him but you can’t base your life around him at this age.”

“You’ve got to think of what _you_ want and need.”

“Don’t make decisions you’ll regret.”

But I couldn’t understand how I’d regret anything if Tweek was there. I hadn’t felt anything for anyone the way I felt for Tweek. Fuck, Tweek made me _feel_ things and not mind it. He made me crazy angry sometimes when we fought, but mostly he made me happy, he made me feel good. And I couldn’t see what could possibly be wrong with that.

Tweek told me they’d said all the same things to him. But he’d rolled his eyes at them and decided to go wherever I would take him.

That was our plan, I’d pick a school where I could study Art, specialising in sculpture and installation, as the only subject I’d cared about in school. In an ideal world I’d be heading to a top school to learn Astrophysics, but by the time I’d cottoned on to what it would really take to get there, I’d slacked off so much in Physics and Math that I’d never get into any course, let alone a good one.

I never understood Physics anyway.

So I threw myself into my art work. I could draw okay, I was decent with a camera, but my real skill was making things, I could use any old shit I found around the house, or I could use clay or paper or wire or anything. Tweek had a menagerie of things made from polymer clay on his desk and around his room. He carefully wrapped every one in newspaper and packed them into a box, even the ones I’d made as a kid. And now I’d found a school a few states over, with not the best, but still a good art school and I started in September.

The conversation had been difficult with Tweek. Or it had been very simple, depending on whose side you were on. I had been agonising for weeks, expecting Tweek wasn’t able to leave his home and his coffee shop and his life in South Park. His therapist was here, his doctor that gave him medication and his support network.

“Of course I’m going with you,” he said, surprised. “You _are_ my support network. What, did you think I was going to stay here? I’m getting out. I’m going where you go.”

“But your doctors…”

“Paediatric,” he said with a shrug. “I need a new one when I hit eighteen anyway.”

My jaw had hung with the ease he said it, and he shook his head with a light smile and turned back to his homework. And like that, the conversation was over.

Later, I asked where he wanted to go, what he wanted to do, and he simply said, “With you.”

It scared me.

Scared because what if all the adults were right, what if we didn’t last and I was forging a path and Tweek was simply following? I pressed on.

“What will you do? What about your dreams?”

“Craig,” he said, taking my hands, he was shaking. That wasn’t unusual. His spasms had turned into a near permanent tremor and the set of vocal tics had reduced, but remained. He had been given a medication that eased his anxiety, but he still shook and jerked when he was panicking. He was still sick.

“I haven’t got dreams. I haven’t got goals. I didn’t think I’d make it this far. But -ngh- I can get a job in any coffee shop. But I wanna be with you.”

Panic suddenly splashed across his face and I squeezed his fingers in mine.

“Of course I want you to come with me,” I reassured quickly, wishing not for the first time, that I could put more expression into my voice. We were opposites in some ways, me and Tweek. He couldn’t stop a waver or a rise in his tone, and I couldn’t change pitch from the rough rumble of my voice if I wanted to.

And that was it. He nodded, forcing himself to calm down. To accept what I’d said as truth. I wanted him by my side and that’s where he wanted to be.

I slept by myself the last night in South Park. I lay awake in my bed, staring up at the fading stars on the ceiling. I’d texted goodnight to Tweek, asked how he was doing. He seemed fine, but I couldn’t stop thinking about how he was going to cope. Coping has never been Tweek’s strong suite and this was a major change.

We’d spent the last month working out what we needed to buy, what we needed to take, what we had and didn’t have and what we’d buy when we were there. I’d taken care of most of it, with Tweek having limited free time, between finishing up school and the extra hours he was picking up at Tweek Bros. coffee shop to earn enough to live until he found work. My dad had promised me a small allowance for the first year of college, but I had to have found part time work by then and be able to support ourselves. Richard Tweak had been less supportive, unimpressed at his son’s leaving. With needing to hire someone to replace the underpaid labour he currently had, and in a dismissive move of Tweek’s choices he _simply couldn’t afford to help_.

The morning we left Tweek came around for breakfast. He often did, so that wasn’t uncommon, but I’d planned to pick him up later in the morning before we left. He knocked on the door, even though my mom had told him to let himself in every time he came over since he was fourteen. He came through to the kitchen, and she set about making him a place at the table, in his seat between me and Tricia. He hadn’t brought anything with him so we’d still have to swing by his. By now my mother knew not to make him a full plate. He picked like a bird at the food on his plate. He never cleared even the smallest serving, and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen him eat at his house.

“My parents -rrgh- already went to work so I came over early,” he explained. I rolled my eyes, unsurprised but still annoyed they hadn’t waited today of all days to see Tweek off. It was a shining example of their negligence towards him. As long as I could remember he’d been looking after himself while his parents all but slept in the coffee shop. I understood it was a business they had to run, but they had a child they had to take care of, not just another employee they didn’t have to pay full rate. Sometimes I think I resented them more on Tweek’s behalf than he did. It didn’t seem to even bother him any more, especially since he’d found a second family in my home that were happy to let him stay here or show up at 7am for breakfast.

He thanked my mother for breakfast and helped me pack our stuff into the car. Tricia even gave us both a hug goodbye. We said goodbye to my parents, picked up the rest of Tweek’s things and we were on the way.

Tweek cheered when we crossed the state lines and sang along to the radio.

I needn’t have worried about him.

He was fine.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just the boys getting comfy. Things are fine for now. :)

We arrived at our new apartment several hours and a couple of coffee stops later. Of all the things that I didn’t think would ever change about Tweek, his caffeine addiction was the top one, though he’d started popping caffeine pills to keep him going through the day.

I worried about his heart sometimes.

Growing up I never worried about anything, nothing was ever important enough to get worked up or stressed about, and I’d often wondered how Tweek could be bothered to be so _Tweek_ all the time about everything, even with the energy he must have gotten from all the caffeine he consumed. Sometimes he was exhausting to be around – those late nights and early mornings, the phone calls, the tears, the paranoia, the hair-pulling/shirt-tugging/crazed-screaming freakouts. The times he wouldn’t calm down and he would yell at me for being so rational. He saw things I couldn’t see. He thought about things I never considered. With his medications, he was calmer. The psychiatrist he’d eventually managed to talk his parents into letting him see gave him something that made him chill out. She gave him something that soothed his wild thoughts, and so now he takes a yellow pill before bed, and four white ones through the day. He had a full script and a letter for the next doctor when we got to the new place.

He lied about how much coffee he drank when she asked about stimulants, like he lied to the dentist, every time he sat in the chair and opened wide to show his damaged teeth. He had a special toothpaste too to try to prevent the damage and started putting milk in his coffee to try to dilute the staining properties. But they were still rotting, making him chew gum and brush his teeth several times a day when he realised his breath was going bad.

Now I worried about his heart, and his decaying teeth, and the pains in his chest and stomach that he always says are nothing. I worry when I don’t see him eat for days, and the way I can count his ribs. I’ve never worried like this about anything. I worry the most about his head, when he spirals downwards into a mess where he can’t separate me from the demons he’s seeing. But that doesn’t happen too often any more.

I still want him to cut back the coffee. It can’t be good for him.

But I let him stop into a road side café for a coffee in a paper cup with a plastic lid when his trusty thermos was emptied. I was starting to get a bit unfocussed after a couple of hours driving, as I rarely made trips that far. We occasionally went over to Denver to go to the big mall there, but Token liked driving, so I would only drive if it was just me and Tweek. Otherwise it was just the drive to school so we didn’t have to catch the bus. My car was an old battered red thing with thousands of miles on the clock, but it was what we could afford when I got my driving license. Someone keyed it less than three months of me getting it in the school parking lot, and I was furious, but I never got around to getting it buffed out. I hoped I’d be able to afford a new one soon. Something nice. Tweek had insisted on spending hours working out finances, researching average wages and rent and bills, putting his incredible hyper-focus onto a huge spreadsheet documenting our monthly income and things we’d have to pay.

“See, here -agh- we just have to put in the actual figures when we have them but this is about what we should be spending on stuff.”

I kissed him.

“You’re amazing but did you sleep last night?”

“Ngh- like half an hour?”

“Go take a nap, babe.”

He smiled, weary and curled up in my bed while I played on my computer.

We arrived at the estate agent’s mid-afternoon and exchanged a look. He popped a caffeine pill and his anxiety meds with a swig of my soda and we went inside. We signed the last of the paperwork as we’d done most of it via post and email. We hadn’t actually _seen_ the place, not being able to arrange a visit on the same day I was visiting the local college, but we’d seen photos, and Tweek had taken the time to write to the tenants and asked them to call us to tell us what it was really like. When we talked about this move, Tweek had been stressed about all the work it was going to take, and I’d calmly and smoothly told him I’d take care of everything. However, every time something needed dealt with, Tweek was already on it. He’d even helped me choose my college by researching which states and cities were most gay friendly, something I hadn’t thought about. Sometimes I think if he hadn’t sorted it, I wouldn’t have ended up leaving Colorado.

He was nervous when we picked up our keys. His road trip smile had vanished, he had a twitch in his face and his left hand was clamped firmly around the hem of his hoodie. Well, it was my hoodie, the one with a green alien on it, but it looked better on him anyway. We signed off for the keys, two of them for a single bedroom apartment in a tower block a twenty minute drive from my college. I plugged the address into my SatNav and we drove in silence.

The front door was green. Dark green. Tweek looked at me and I handed him a key. I looked at the paper in my hand, but Tweek had already learned the six digits and entered it, pushing the block door open. We were on the fourth floor and I hoped it wasn’t a building with the elevator was often out. I wasn’t unfit, I liked to run, but the idea of climbing floors of stairs with shopping and whatever else wasn’t that appealing. When the previous tenants had called us, Tweek had shoved his phone into my hands with a list of questions he wanted answering about the apartment, but the elevator status wasn’t one of them.

We stood for a moment outside of the internal door, the one that would let us into our apartment. _Our_ apartment. I swallowed. It felt like the first day of the rest of my life, as cheesy as that sounds. It was true. I was an adult now, moving into my first home with my boyfriend.

It was crazy.

“Ngh- this is so stressful,” Tweek muttered through gritted teeth.

“It’s fine. Everything’s fine.”

I unlocked the door, and let us in. Tweek immediately set about checking the corners, poking about behind furniture and under sofa cushions.

“What are you doing?”                                                                                           

“Checking for mold. They said there was no mold. What if there’s mold!?” he said, his voice growing higher.

“They said there was no mold, so there’s no mold.”

“What if the spores get into our lungs and-“

I took his hand, unclenching his fingers and kissing his white knuckles.

“No mold. No spores. Calm down.”

“Okay, okay…”

He took a breath.

“I need coffee.”

Of course he did. Tweek Tweak always needed a coffee.

We started unloading stuff out of the car, starting with the coffee machine and his favourite Sunrise Brew coffee his dad had packed a few bags of for him. I waited while he set it up and started it perking the coffee. When we came back up with the second load of stuff, the small, open plan apartment was smelling of coffee, and consequently, of Tweek. I hated the unfamiliar smell of new places, like when we moved house when I was seven and Tricia was four and she needed a proper sized bedroom. One of my favourite things was the way people’s houses smelled. Okay, that sounds weird, but it was comforting, being at Token’s or Clyde’s and it smelling homey and comfortable. I didn’t like being at the Tweak’s because it smelled lonely. I hoped our house would smell warm.

We had most of the stuff out of the car by the time the coffee was ready, he poured a mug, topped it up with milk and downed it. He poured a second, and drank half the cup before he sighed, his shoulders relaxing at his hit. I didn’t drink coffee, couldn’t stand the taste of it, but I would take a caffeine pill if I was tired, and that was enough to make me buzzed for hours, so I didn’t know how Tweek could stand having all that going around in his system all the time. Tolerance, I guess.

We brought the last of the stuff up and collapsed on the sofa, surrounded by boxes of our stuff, and the first round of groceries courtesy of my parents. We’d rented a furnished place, being unable to afford a full set of furniture at this point.

Tweek looked at me seriously, calmly, barely shaking. The Sunrise Blend did the trick.

“I love you,” he said.

I nodded and laced our fingers together. I was bad with words, always had been. He gave me a light squeeze and pushed up from the sofa. He rummaged through the papers on the kitchen counter and found what he was looking for.

“What you got there?”

“Inventory. Just gonna check we have everything. Where do you think the vacuum is?”

We spent a half hour checking everything was in order, then Tweek spent another half hour cleaning ‘just in case’, even though it was already spotless, as the estate agents had assured us there’d been a cleaning crew in. We made the bed, arranged the kitchen how we wanted it, and started on the boxes. That dream of domestic bliss we always talked about was suddenly not so far off. I could imagine us waking up together every morning, eating together every night, listening to music together. Arguing about whose turn it is to wash the dishes and then ending up laughing. I never thought I’d have such _romantic_ dreams, but there was something about Tweek that changed me. I wanted to give him the moon and all the stars.

He was the moon and all the stars.

God, what is wrong with me?

I shook the sappy thoughts out of my head and helped him move the huge suitcases of clothes into the bedroom and realised we didn’t have coat hangers. We decided that was a problem for another day.

“Bed?”

He nodded, looking fatigued. He finished off the last of the second pot of coffee he’d brewed and checked the door was locked. And then went back to check it again, mumbling about getting a second lock for the door.

“It’s fine, no-one will get in. You checked this was a safe area.”

“I know… but what if-“

“It’s fine,” I stated flatly, taking his hand and leading him to the bedroom. We got undressed, hesitating at our boxers. We often slept in underwear or pyjama bottoms when we were back at my parents, just in case anyone came in. Tweek grinned, a slow, coy smile that spread across his face and he dropped his boxers too.

“It’s our place, right?”

I finished undressing and climbed into bed, wrapped my arms around him and pulled him close. I had thought about something fun, like having sex in every room to christen the place, but when it came to it, I couldn’t be bothered that night. I was too tired, even with Tweek’s slightly shaking form naked against me.

“We should get new stars for the ceiling,” he whispered into the darkness.

“Yeah. We should.”

I yawned, no longer worried about anything at all.

Everything was fine.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the comments and kudos on this <3

“When I get a job, we’re getting Stripe number nine and Spot number three,” Tweek informed me, his arms stuck awkwardly out from his sides. I finished buttoning his navy shirt and he dropped his hands. “Thanks.”

I didn’t often button his shirts these days, but he was nervous and still waiting for his morning anxiety medication to kick in, so his hands weren’t working properly. Mornings were often hard for Tweek, at least until his pill and coffee had started to work. When we were ten and he wore shirts every day, because his dad made him, something about presentation being like the morning dew on the daisies. Richard Tweak spouts some weird simile for a lot of things, and after a few conversations with him I understood why Tweek got so stressed out by his parents. Their docile, calming manner did nothing to mask the fact that they had nothing helpful to say to him, or any sort of awareness of his difficulties at all. He once told me I was the first person to bother listening to him, and that made my heart hurt for him. A child shouldn’t have to rely on someone like me to listen to them. Especially when I was such a stoic and belligerent child, flipping off anyone that even spoke to me.

He stopped wearing shirts when he was twelve, and I don’t think his dad ever noticed. I used to button them up properly in the school bathroom every morning before class, fixing the ones he got wrong where he couldn’t quite get them to line up and stopped bothering to try.

“You’ll be great.”

He was going job hunting today. He had printed off copies of his resumé and was wearing a shirt with his jeans. He’d tamed his wild hair as much as he could, and had spent at least five minutes in front of the mirror agonising over his sleep bruised eyes and the twitch on one side of his mouth that wouldn’t stop. I had to shut the cupboard door with the mirror inside to make him stop finding things to stress about.

He had refused breakfast, even though he basically hadn’t eaten the day before, but gratefully accepted a cup of Sunrise Brew that I got up before him to percolate. I planned to make a dinner tonight when he got home. It wasn’t that I wanted to _change_ him, but I did want to try to cut down his caffeine and up the amount he ate. I wanted to help him maintain a healthy life and prevent him from dying of a heart attack by the time he was thirty, which didn’t sound unreasonable to me.

He’d had his coffee, then trailed into the kitchen without dressing for another mugful, probably two. He came back in a moment later looking a little brighter, albeit twitchier, and got dressed. He’d insisted on catching a bus into town, even though I said I would drive him.

“No,” he said, standing up a little straighter, “I need to be able to get places alone. What would I do when you’re at school?”

I shrugged and watched him try to button his shirt with jerky hands until he growled in frustration and I stood to do it myself.

He put on his jacket and shoes and kissed me goodbye, the map to the bus stop open on his phone. He wasn’t great with directions so Google Maps helped him out a lot. The bus schedule was open in another window. He locked the door behind him as I watched him go. The apartment felt sort of empty immediately. Another thing Tweek changed about me. I used to get annoyed being around too many people or anyone for too long. Token and Clyde were the only people I could stand for any length of time and now I was here almost missing Tweek already.

Speaking of my two friends, I dropped a message into the group chat to let them know we had arrived and then immediately remembered I hadn’t called Mom. I gave her a quick ring, listened while she told me off for not calling yesterday like I promised I would as soon as we got there.

I spent the next few hours with music blasting, unpacking boxes, remembering to text Tweek to buy coat hangers, but folding the rest of the clothes into drawers. I was sweating and tired by the time Tweek’s key sounded in the door.

“Welcome home!” I yelled through from the bedroom. There was a shelf above the bed that I was carefully arranging Tweek’s ornaments, mostly the small sculptures I had made for him, around a framed photo of us with Token and Clyde from the prom night Clyde talked us into going to. I didn’t want to celebrate with the rest of the assholes we’d been stuck with since elementary, but when even Tweek said it might be fun, I had to give in.

Tweek came into the bedroom and dropped a carrier bag on the bed and leaned in to kiss me before wrinkling his nose.

“You smell terrible,” he commented.

“Missed you too, babe. Any luck?”

“I got a bunch of CVs in; one store has a place and they’re going to -ngh- contact me. Maybe.”

“That’s great. What do you want for dinner?”

“I don’t know. I’m not hungry.”

I fixed him with a hard look.

“You need to start eating more.”

He rolled his eyes and left the room. I heard the coffee machine powering up with a beep. He clattered about for a moment and didn’t come back in. He probably hadn’t had a coffee since he left in the morning, and would feel better after having one.

Asking him to eat more was not new territory for us, we’d had some heated conversations regarding his constant weight loss, and now he just left the room when I mentioned it, apparently. I sighed, unwilling to start a fight the day after moving in, and decided I would make dinner, and we’d sit and eat it. Or as much as he would. He always said he just wasn’t hungry. At one point I had it in my head that he had an eating disorder, and he was doing it to get thinner. Or that he was puking it, and that’s why his teeth were damaged. Of course he had stomach pains, he must have been starving. His health was one of my top (and only) concerns, but he got defensive whenever I brought it up.

I finished on the shelf and went into the kitchen to see half a pot of coffee left in the machine, and Tweek leaning against the counter.

“I don’t do it on purpose,” he started, not meeting my eyes. I leaned against the doorframe and watched him. The corners of his mouth were turned down.

“I know, honey. It’s okay. I’m just… you know.”

“Worried?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m fine. It’s okay.”

He twitched and finished his coffee, immediately pouring another. I didn’t say anything.

“I got better coffee while I was out. Your parents bought instant. Thanks, but no thanks.”

He looked exhausted.

“How did you sleep last night?” I asked, approaching him and giving him a gentle kiss.

“Not good. Not sure I did. What if no-one wants to -ngh- hire me? What if I don’t get work?”

“You will. I’m going to look too, soon.”

He sighed.

“Do you want to have a nap?”

He drained his cup and put it on the side.

“Yeah.”

He led the way to the bedroom and unbuttoned his shirt, dropping it in the laundry basket. After a second thought he took off his jeans and slid under the sheets. I followed suit and undressed. In bed, he put his arms around my neck and kissed me deeply, leaning against my side.

“I thought you were tired,” I teased. He shrugged and tangled his fingers in my hair, slipping his tongue into my mouth. I pulled him closer, running my short nails over his skin.

Despite having been together since we got set up by the whole of South Park in fourth grade, we were slow to develop our relationship. We had been together almost two years before we had our first chaste kiss, over a very sweet Christmas present.

Tweek had given me a star.

More accurately, he’d had a star named after me, which is pretty funny to think there’s a star in Draco called Craig, of all boring things. It came with a map of the stars showing star Craig’s position in the night sky. It was on my bedroom wall, and now it’s in the living room, leaning against the sofa. I should have asked Tweek to get picture hooks too.

It was such a thoughtful and sweet gift that I had to kiss him on his chapped lips. He was so surprised, he shrieked. Then kissed me back and got embarrassed and ran away. It was months later that we learned to kiss properly. It progressed slowly, but naturally over the next several years.

We did go to sleep after that. I stayed awake for a while, waiting for Tweek to doze off, which he did fairly quickly for him, and then let myself slip into sleep.

Everything was fine. Better than fine.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh dear, here we go...

The next few weeks passed in a blur. I started college, and in possibly the most exciting thing that’s happened to me in my school career, I chose a great little corner of the studio to be my own personal studio space for the next three years. It was tucked out of the way, next to a quiet, but friendly girl called Marie, who I could see myself getting along with in peace. I wasn’t here to make friends, but I knew that I’d have to manage to not make enemies either. Thankfully, we were all like-minded, creatively driven, and we’d have to feedback on each other’s projects. I could quickly identify who was going to annoy me, and made a point of staying away from them. Try-hards and over-noisy types. But in my corner I was safe. There was a set of lockable drawers in each studio that we could leave materials in, so I was relieved I wouldn’t have to lug around my sculpting materials around with me every day.

I threw myself back into my art, the only thing I knew how to do, and revelled in the beautiful workspace that was all mine. The studios were open from nine to six every week day. So I spent most of my day there, and came home, and Tweek and I cooked dinner together and he tried to eat as much as he could, which was not a lot, but it was something. I didn’t push him again about it.

Tweek had gone through a series of interviews and a trial shift and done brilliantly, getting a job, not in a coffee shop, but in in a grocery store. It wasn’t much, but there was the scope for more hours, even though the pay wouldn’t raise, unless he got a promotion.

I had some lectures, but a lot of the time was free for us to work on our projects in our studio spaces, so I went in late and came home early on the days where Tweek wasn’t working, and did exactly what the adults had all told me not to, and arranged my schedules around him wherever I could.

Money was a little tight, with Tweek not getting the full time hours he’d hoped for, but I’d put applications in in places around the town. However, I was at a disadvantage – Tweek had been working in Tweek Bros his whole life, and I’d never worked a day. I could only hope someone would take on a student on weekends and evenings, with no work history.

Tweek relaxed. I noticed it in the way he stood up a little straighter, he smiled his sunshine smile more, he laughed and joked. He wasn’t so stiff, and it was amazing to see. He was really getting to be himself. I loved him more every day.

“You’re all the stars in the sky,” I would whisper to him at night, in the dark where he couldn’t feel my embarrassment as I shoved the affection out of my mouth in a hard tone. I was not a romantic boy, by any stretch, but Tweek knew me enough to know that I loved him. He would laugh, and tell me he wasn’t all of them because at least one was called Craig.

He slept better too, I would sometimes be asleep after him and watch him in the morning light, the sunrise catching on his golden hair and illuminating the constellations of freckles across his skin. He enjoyed his job, with much fairer bosses than his parents had ever been. He would wake up looking refreshed and… well not really calm, because he still never really seemed calm until a couple of cups of coffee. He’d come home from work to a fresh pot of coffee if I was home to brew it, and he’d hungrily down it until he stopped shaking again.

We registered at the local doctors and dentist. Tweek got referred to a psychiatrist and psychologist in our new town in advance, so he could pick up with the new doctors with ease. The dentist tutted at the state of his teeth and the new psychologist got a run down of his mental health to date. The psychiatrist got his list of medications and continued to prescribe them.

As promised, we got a new pair of guinea pigs, Stripe nine and Spot three. It had taken six piggies before I actually bothered to learn enough about them that they should live in pairs, and Tweek jokingly named Stripe seven’s sister Spot, and the tradition had stuck from there.

We didn’t fight. We spent hours watching movies and playing video games and just talking. It was so much better than just fine. It was calm, almost boring in that way that I always wanted life to be.

Until Tweek got sick.

He started out just tired. He ached all over, like his muscles were exhausted, but he couldn’t sleep. He was tossing and turning in bed for hours, and drinking more coffee than before. He said he felt rotten. We thought it might be stress catching up and he made an appointment with the psychiatrist. Dr Ramir prescribed him a drug that made him sleep, but it made him shake worse than ever, and he was groggy all day. He drank more coffee, downing cup after cup.

The first day he called in sick from work he’d been unable to lift his head from under the covers, a headache terrorizing his brain. I took him a cup of coffee and some painkillers.

“How are you doing, babe?”

“Ngh.”

He took the coffee with shaking hands and I passed him his meds.

“I don’t think I like the mirtazapine,” he slurred. I didn’t like it either. It made him slow and emotionless. He had told me he was unable to focus, and screwing up at work. It wasn’t making him better. “I’m not taking it anymore.”

“You can’t just stop taking your meds. It might wear off.”

“I was better before.”

I didn’t say anything, he wasn’t wrong. Now he just wanted to sleep all the time and he never smiled. He swallowed the pill for anxiety without protest. The propranolol was good for him. We agreed on that too.

“Talk to Dr. Ramir and see if you can get it changed.”

“I’m not taking it,” he said stubbornly and lay back down, his hands in his hair. I rubbed his back soothingly until he fell asleep.

I decided to bunk off college, I didn’t have any lectures, and it wouldn’t hurt to take a day off to make sure Tweek was okay. I sat in the living room with the volume low on the television and waited for him to wake up. When he stumbled through a few hours later I turned the TV off and the coffee machine on. He’d run out of Sunrise Brew a couple of days before and had switched to the coffee he’d bought in town when we first moved in. He said it wasn’t as good, but the closest thing he could find in taste.

He sat down and I poured him a glass of water and gave him some more painkillers.

“My stomach hurts,” he mumbled. “I -ngh- need a coffee.”

“It’s brewing. How are you feeling?”

He twitched, a full head-tilt, face-spasm twitch. They were infrequent usually, but seemed all too common now. Maybe the new meds were bringing this back. 

“Bad. I feel rottEN.” His vocal tics had come back around, occasionally unable to control the volume of his voice. He wouldn’t have done well at work today. “Nothing feels -agh- real.”

I pulled out my phone.

“I’m making you an appointment with Dr. Ramir.”

He nodded and I dialled. I was able to arrange an appointment for the end of the week when I explained that Tweek was getting horrible side-effects and refused to take the pills any more.

He didn’t make it to work the next day either.

But he was going to be fine after his appointment. He had to be.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shit hits the fan m'dudes.

“NGH- WHY ISN’T IT WORKING?” He screamed, dropping his coffee cup with a smash and grabbing at his hair, pulling hard. He sank down onto the floor, tears rolling down his face. I rushed to his side, crouching beside him. I pulled him up from the floor and sat him down on the sofa. He was sobbing uncontrollably.

“Why isn’t it working?” he asked again through gasping breaths.

“What isn’t what working?”

“The coffee, it always makes me feel better but I JUST FEEL SO BAD!”

I pulled him in close, stroking his hair. He’d seemed a little less sluggish off the medication, but not anywhere near where he used to be. He spasmed in my arms, whether from crying or just another tic he couldn’t control, I didn’t know. I held him while he cried himself out, all the stress of the last week and a half mounting in an explosion from him.

“Tell me how you feel,” I said slowly.

“I feel… I feel -ngh- sad. And tired. Nothing feels real, everything is wrong.”

“Wrong, how?”

“There’s shadows everywhere, I can hear things and I don’t know if they’re real.”

“You need to tell the doctor this afternoon.”

“Will you come with me?” he asked urgently.

“I wasn’t letting you go alone.”

In the waiting room of the therapist, Tweek’s hands were clenched tightly around my own and his leg was bouncing, his heel tapping against the floor. We didn’t speak as we waited to be called in. Dr. Ramir opened the door and greeted us warmly, leading us into his office.

“Hello again Tweek, hi there,” he said, shaking our hands in turn.

“Hi, I’m Craig, Tweek’s boyfriend, we spoke on the phone” I said, feeling oddly formal. We took the seats beside the desk and he fixed Tweek with a concerned look.

“Craig tells me you’re not getting on with the mirtazapine.”

“NGH- it makes me worse! I’m- I’m tired and I feel bad. I’m seeing things again.”

“What sort of things?”

I took Tweek’s hands, which were clenched tightly in the hem of his jacket and laced my fingers through his. He didn’t look the doctor in the eyes, choosing a spot on the carpet to focus on.

“There’s shadows on everything, things are moving. Breathing. I… -ngh- I keep hearing people talking and laughing when there’s no-one there!”

His knuckles were white around my hands. I wriggled my fingers to remind him to loosen up.

The psychiatrist made some notes on his paper. The room felt heavy, stifling. How did Tweek not die of stress coming here?

He asked questions and Tweek answered, and I had no idea it had gotten so bad so fast. He told the doctor what he heard, how it sounded, what they said to him. They talked about his history of hearing things, seeing things. He asked Tweek if he’d ever been diagnosed with psychosis. Tweek shook his head and shivered all over. _Psychosis_ is a big, scary word for two eighteen year olds out on their own for the first time.

 “How’s your mood?” Ramir asked, making more notes.

Tweek scrunched up his face and spoke even quieter than before.

“I feel bad. Really bad. It’s like… I want to… ARGH.”

“Have you been feeling suicidal?” Dr. Ramir leaned in and my grip tightened.

Tears plopped onto our hands. Tweek used to cry from stress a lot, but I’d never seen him so _sad_.

“Go on, Tweek. It’s okay,” I urged.

“I don’t know,” he answered quietly. “I don’t know.”

Tweek left the appointment with new prescriptions and new diagnoses. We waited at the pharmacy for it to be made up, he leaned against my shoulder, his eyes downcast and his face pale. He read the label and opened the boxes to examine his medicines. One white oval at night, and one peach round in the morning.

He went back to work the next day, but came home early, after having a small meltdown. He went straight to bed.

At half three the next morning he woke me up, clutching his stomach in pain.

“Craig, it hurts, oh JESUS! What if I’m dying?!”

“Tweek, calm down. You aren’t dying. What hurts?”

“My stomach! My chest! My head! I don’t know, everywhere! NGH- it hurts!”

I sat up, panicked. Tweek was known for overreacting when we were younger, but he had managed to become so much more rational recently. Seeing the terror and pain on his face scared me. What if he was really sick? He was doubled over, hanging his head and moaning in agony.

“Is it really bad?”

“I think I’m DYING!”

I moved fast, helping him into a pair of jogging pants and a hoodie, getting myself dressed and grabbing our shoes. I bundled him into the car and found the nearest hospital on my SatNav. The roads were empty and I drove fast, racing towards getting Tweek help.

I filled out his parent’s insurance details at the desk with his help and we waited to be called through. Tweek shook and whined, doubled over the pains wracking his body, and I held him close, glaring death threats to anyone that so much as looked at us. He wasn’t the only one crying, there was other people in pain, but I didn’t care about them, I wanted Tweek seen and cured _now._ After what felt like a year we were called to a doctor, who _too fucking slowly_ asked questions, nodding and writing notes in Tweek’s file.

“Have you taken any drugs recently?”

“WHAT? Jesus, no! There could be anything in them!”

“Hm.”

He fixed Tweek with a sceptical look, eyes running over his gaunt, drawn face, his skinny frame, his bad teeth in his gasping mouth.

“You’re very thin, do you eat normally?”

“Not enough. Not nearly enough,” I interjected.

Tweek glared at me through the pain and the doctor nodded.

“We’ll run some tests.”

The tests were a heart trace, blood pressure, blood samples, a urine sample and oddly, a hair sample. They gave him some paracetamol, which didn’t affect him at all.

“GOD, I need something stronger. It hurts!”

He curled up with his head on my lap while we waited for the results to come back. I was starting to get really pissed off, he was in serious pain, what if he was having a heart attack from the caffeine or kidney failure from not eating enough? What if he was dying and no-one was doing a damn thing to help him?

“Why’s it taking so long? What if -NGH- something’s really wrong?”

“If there was something really wrong they’d have sorted you out already. It’s going to be fine,” I said, sounding flat and confident, even though I was reassuring myself as much as him. It took two and a half hours, but we were called back through to hear the results.

The doctor did not look impressed.

“Most of your tests came back normal,” he started, flicking through the papers in front of him. “However, we ran a drug test. You had traces of methamphetamine in your urine and follicle sample. Your symptoms are in line with withdrawal. When did you last take it?”

“WHAT?” he screamed again. My head was spinning. I stared at him. Tweek took _meth_? I tore my gaze away from Tweek to look back to the doctor.

“There must be a mistake.”

Tweek’s hands were in his hair, his mouth open. His drawn face. His rotten teeth. His anxiety. His paranoia.

“We’d like to check your liver and kidney functions, as use of methamphetamine can be damaging, but drug abuse won’t be covered by your insurance. The pains you’re feeling will clear up in a week or two.”

“No, this isn’t right. Tweek doesn’t take meth,” I stated, numbed.

“It was found in the urine sample. Maybe you’d like to step outside so I can speak to Tweek alone?”

“Don’t leave!” he shrieked. “Craig, I don’t take meth, you know I would never-“

I stood up.

“I’ll be in the waiting room.”

Tweek held out a hand, unsure. I left.

I waited for a further nineteen minutes and thirty seven seconds, watching the clock on the wall tick round, blank. My mine was racing, piecing things together but I couldn’t feel it. I couldn’t catch a single thought and let it all just fly past me as the second hand ticked its way through the minutes. Tweek stumbled towards me those minutes and seconds later and I just stared at him. His usually pale face was stained pink with tears and his eyes were darting around the room.

“Craig, I swear-“

I shook my head.

“Tell me the truth, Tweek. I deserve the truth.”

“I didn’t. I _wouldn’t_.”

“What did the doctor say?” I asked, colder than I meant to sound.

“I’m in meth withdrawal.”

“And how did that happen if you _haven’t fucking taken meth?”_

“I don’t know!” he cried.

I stood up. He followed me silently to the car and didn’t say a word all the way home. I locked the door when we came in and he disappeared to the bedroom. I lay awake all night, spending hours researching meth use, withdrawal and all the damage Tweek had done to himself.

How could he take _meth_ of all the fucking drugs, and then lie to me about it?

How did everything get so fucked? It was supposed to be fine.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh dear.

Tweek didn’t leave the bedroom all morning. I paced about the living room and kitchen, unsure what to do with myself. I wanted to smash everything, break his coffee machine, all the little presents I made for him. Then I wanted to cry and hold him and tell him it was okay, I forgave him, but then I flipped back to mad and didn’t know how to fucking cope with this.

His phone was on the arm of the sofa. It rang, _Dad_ , said the illuminated screen. I stared at it for a second, then decided. I answered.

“Hi, this is Craig.”

“ _Oh hey Craig, is Tweek there?_ ”

“Not right now. But hey, we were at the hospital last night.”

“ _Oh?_ ” He didn’t sound concerned at all. But I’d never heard Richard Tweak sound concerned about anything.

“Yeah. They found meth in his system. Your kid’s a methhead.”

The bedroom door slammed open, and Tweek lunged for the phone, eyes wide and terrified. I held him back, waiting for Richard’s answer.

“ _It’s just to help him concentrate. He has ADD, you know,_ ” he said breezily.

I stood still, stunned. Tweek grabbed the phone out of my hands and pressed it to his face, screaming into it.

“JESUS IT’S NOT TRUE! I SWEAR I DIDN-“

He fell silent suddenly. I heard Richard’s soft tone talking to him, unfazed by the accusations. He slowly held the phone away from his face, his dad still talking, and dropped it onto the hardwood flooring with a crack. It went dead. His hands flew to his hair and he _screamed_. He screamed wordless noise like I had never heard, a guttural, animalistic sound of pure emotion. Whether it was rage, fear, or something else I couldn’t tell, but it scared the shit out of me.

I grabbed his arms.

“Tweek! Tweek, it’s okay! What the fuck?!”

He gasped for breath, and stared wildly around, unable to focus. Panic was settling over his face and he was losing the plot, fast.

“Tweek, look at me.”

Tweek fought to focus in on me. His breathing was fast and shallow. I exaggerated some deep breaths.

“Breathe with me, deep breaths.”

He struggled to breathe, his face twitching and his expression wild. I breathed slowly, until he’d calmed down a little.

“Talk to me, babe. What did he say?”

“He did it,” he said, his voice as distant as his eyes.

“What?”

“He put it in the coffee.”

He looked at me and nodded like I understood. It took a moment for it to click, all of it, all the thoughts I’d had in the hospital, all the little signs over the past week. The Sunrise Brew. Richard put _meth_ in the _Sunrise Brew_. Relief and guilt rushed over me in a great wave and I wanted to cry. I pulled him close into a tight, crushing hug.

“I’m so sorry, Tweek. I’m so sorry.”

“He put it in the coffee,” he said again. His voice was even and calm, his stance absolutely still. I’d never seen him so absent or so motionless. Tweek was broken. “He’s been poisoning me.”

I moved back to look at him. His pale, lovely face, all the skin pulled tight, looking older than he was, and I understood it all. His poor battered teeth by fuck knows how many years of drinking that shit. His skinny frame wasted away. His damaged organs that we couldn’t afford to get checked out.

“He put Valium in the Sunset Brew.” His eyes were glazed over as he stared at some far-off point, not even seeing. Richard and his wife drank Sunset Brew and it made sense. Their docile, faraway expressions. Their absent tone of voice. “They never let me drink that one. They gave me Sunrise. I’ve been drinking it since…”

“Since when?”

“I don’t know. Forever. Who gives a kid coffee? Who gives a kid meth?”

I preferred him exploding. I can handle meltdowns. I can deal with screaming and crazy paranoia. I didn’t know how to deal with this complete shut-down. I had no idea what to do. He hadn’t stopped crying, tears rolling silently down his face. I rubbed his arms, trying to bring him back to me.

“It all makes sense. All the… the thoughts and the fucking spasms and it’s all the _fucking meth!_ I could have had a normal FUCKING LIFE!” he was shouting again by the end of the sentence. Be careful what you wish for, I thought, as I realised it wasn’t his suddenly placidity I couldn’t make sense of, it was the whole fucked up situation.

I didn’t know how to help. At all.

I couldn’t think of anything to say, anything to do that was going to make him better. When I focussed back on him, he was standing, limp, his arms hanging helplessly by his sides. I took him to the sofa and sat him down. Normally I would have held him, made him a coffee, listened to his thoughts, and tell him it was okay. None of that would have helped, I couldn’t tell him it was fine and he was safe when he’d just found out his parents had spiked his coffee for his whole life. I pulled him close against my chest and he curled up around himself, clutching my hand tightly. I rubbed his back and let him cry quietly, feeling tears slip down my own face. I was shaken, I was in shock, I never cried. I couldn’t comprehend how Tweek must have been feeling, to find out his whole life had been a lie.

“I stayed -ngh- -ARGH- up all night reading about it.”

Oh. So he’d probably read all the same things I had, and it had all pieced togetehter just like it had for me. Everything he’d had to struggle and fight against since he could remember. Since elementary, he’d been that _twitchy little freak_. I learned things I never wanted to know about meth. His short stature was a mix of stunted growth and malnutrition because his parents didn’t make him eat, and meth had been surpressing his appetite.

“The outlook is good from here,” I said, trying to find anything reassuring to say. It was true, if he could push past the withdrawal, his liver and kidneys could recover. He probably should never drink alchohol, and he couldn’t go near drugs again, but he could get better quite fast.

Physically at least. His head would be battered. Anhedonia. The inability to feel happiness, because of his damaged dopamine response. Years and years of automatic floods of the little happy chemical had made his brain stop making it and it could take years to start working properly again. Who knows how long Tweek’s damaged brain could take?

“I’m never going to be normal.”

I had no answer this time. No sensible, soothing response. No, he wasn’t going to be normal. I mean, we knew there was a chance he’d never be off his medication, and maybe never calm those last tics, or stop the racing thoughts and the demons that lived in his head, but to know the reason was damaging in a way we couldn’t have anticipated.

“I love you,” I said, holding him close. “I love you.”

He was quiet, shaking. We stayed still, clinging to each other tightly like we were drowning. Several minutes passed until Tweek spoke again.

“What if I never -ngh- get better?”

I sat up straight to look at him sternly, drinking in his red eyes, his wavering mouth, and imagined what he would look like healthy. I wanted to see that. I needed it. Tweek needed it.

“You will. Withdrawal is only for a few weeks, and I’ll be right with you.” I sounded confident, I always did. I wasn’t feeling confident though, I felt broken and smashed up inside. The world was collapsing, and I was the last person holding it together. I had to be strong for Tweek. If he saw me fall apart we’d never get up off the floor again. He stood up suddenly.

“I’m going to sleep.”

He went into the kitchen and I watched him get painkillers out of the cupboard, swallowing two codeine. I had read the worst of it was a raging headache, which Tweek got, and always pegged it down to needing a coffee.

Tweek Tweak always needed a coffee. Not any more, I realised, watching him move jerkily around the kitchen, passing the coffee machine. I caught on too slowly about what he was going to do and had barely managed to move by the time he had ripped it from the wall and smashed it against the wall with a shriek. Finally regaining the use of my body, I ran to the kitchen and dragged him to the bedroom. He let me undress him and push him into the bed, as malleable as a ragdoll. I lay down, cocooning us both safely in the blankets.

I don’t know how long we lay in bed awake, thinking, not talking. Every so often Tweek would be wracked with fresh wave of tears, but eventually his breathing evened out and deepened.

I felt stupid for thinking this was ever going to be fine.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're burning through them here. It's gonna be okay guys, I promise.

After laying awake for so long, I didn’t think I’d ever get to sleep, but when I woke, disoriented, Tweek wasn’t there. I blearily climbed out of bed and shuffled into the living room. Night had fallen and the apartment was in darkness.

“Tweek?” I called out, looking around for him. He was sitting huddled up on the sofa. I hit the lights, and he screeched covering his eyes. His head must have hurt. I turned it off again.

“Sorry, sorry,” I said hastily.

In the darkness, from the meagre light from the streets below, I saw him look at me, a hard expression on his face I rarely saw.

“What for?”

“The, uh, lights.”

“Not for selling me out?”

“What?”

“You told on me.”

The memory of not hesitating before I spilled to Richard on the phone came rushing back to me. I hadn’t paused, it had all just come out of my mouth before I could think. I’d been up all night believing that Tweek had been taking meth of his own volition for fuck knows how long, and then lied to me about it. I was hurt and I wanted to spite him. No, that’s not entirely true.

“I didn’t-“

“Save it, Craig. You didn’t believe me and then you told on me.” There was venom dripping from his voice.

“What was I supposed to think? I didn’t think they’d have… I thought it was you.”

“You should _know_ me! You should know I wouldn’t go near it. You should _know_ I wouldn’t lie to you!”

“I was scared, okay!” That was my real motive for telling Richard and I knew it. So terrified about what was happening with Tweek, more frightened than I’d ever felt before, I’d said the one thing I thought could have finally made the man react, finally help his son. But I’d been wrong. Richard didn’t care. He never had.

Tweek was shaking, his face in an expression I’d never seen and couldn’t identify. He got up, put his shoes on without socks and grabbed his jacket.

“I’m going out.”

I moved in the way of the door.

“Where?”

“I can’t trust my parents, I can’t trust you, I can’t trust -ngh- anyone. I feel like shit. I’m getting meth.”

“Fuck! No, you’re not! You can get clean. I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to!”

“I know what I need to feel better.”

“You’ll feel better soon, we can ride it out together.”

Pushing past me, he reached for the door. I grabbed his arm, holding tightly.

“Get off me,” he growled, with more distrust and viciousness than I’d ever heard in his voice before.

He shoved me out of the way, and slammed the door behind him. I chased after him, running down the hall, shouting his name. He ran out into the street, and barefoot, I followed. He stopped, turned to me, breathing hard.

“JUST FUCK OFF! LEAVE ME ALONE!”

“Please stop! I’m sorry! I didn’t know what else to do, I needed to get you help!” I yelled, uncontrolled.

He stared me down for a moment longer before sagging, his shoulders and face going slack. Like he’d given up.

“I need this, Craig. I’ve never needed anything like this. I’ll be home soon.”

He ran, and I didn’t follow. Maybe I should have done, I don’t know. Something about the starving way he’d said it, with his eyes dulled and wide. I should have tried harder to stop him, but he didn’t want me to. He didn’t want me to follow this time. I wanted to say I was with him, I wanted to say I’d go too, but I couldn’t watch him make a deal with a junkie for a toxic hit just to feel better in ways I’d never be able to give him.

_I never needed anything like this._

It echoed in my head as I went back to the apartment, pushing the door shut and leaving it unlocked, so he could come in whenever he got back. He needed drugs more than he needed me right now, much though I didn’t want to take it personally. He was suffering in a way I couldn’t understand. This wasn’t a panic attack he needed soothed from, this wasn’t a paranoia he needed reassuring over. It was a hard, cold addiction that I couldn’t fix. His craving was stronger than his fears of strangers, of the dark, of drugs. It was stronger than both of us together.

Tweek did things to me. He could make me lose my composure completely, he could make me unravel. He could make me care deeper than I thought I even had in me, and devastate me when I was hurt. No, that’s not right. I hurt him first. He scared me like nothing else, and these past few days had been terrifying. I was Craig fucking Tucker and I wasn’t scared of anything except _him_. I couldn’t care less if I got hurt, or died, or anything. Rollercoasters, horror movies, dark alleys at night, whatever. Tweek running off for methamphetamine in the dark hours before sunrise? Pure fear.

I didn’t know if he was safe, I didn’t know what they’d do. A strung-out teenager paying anything for a fix. He was too small, too sick, too weak to be out there on his own. I should have gone with him at any length. _Fuck_ , I would have held his hand while he took it if that’s what he needed. I’d let him down again.

I poked around our home, checked around, but couldn’t find his phone. I found mine under my pillow in the bedroom, and pulled up his number. I thought about calling him, but I didn’t know what to say even if he did answer. I tapped out a short message instead.

_Please come home safe._

I waited. And texted again.

_Let me know where you are. I can come with you._

_Please just answer to let me know you’re safe. I’m so scared for you._

I turned my phone up to full volume and dialled. It rang off. I left it on the side where I could hear it and sat down heavily. I wanted to go after him now, but I had no idea where he would be. I didn’t want him to come home and for me to not be there. I thought about calling the police, but I didn’t want to get him arrested for possession. He wouldn’t be a missing person for two days yet.

Instead I cleaned up the coffee machine, the glass pot shattered across the tiles. The plastic of the machine was cracked, the lid snapped. I dumped the whole thing in the bin and swept up the glass. I tidied the living room, simultaneously trying to keep my mind blank and also think about how the ever-loving fuck I was going to make this better. I cleaned out the guinea pigs, letting them out into their run that was set up in the living room. I fed them spinach, listening to their happy _wheeping_ , no idea that we were having the hardest times of their lives. I sat by the run, watching them play with the tunnels and bridges we had set up.

I grabbed my phone and started looking up rehabs. I found Narcotics Anonymous meetings nearby, but with a sinking feeling realised we couldn’t afford proper rehab either. We were going to have to do this alone. But together. We’d do it together. Only if Tweek came home safe and was willing to get clean. If he wasn’t able to get off the meth, there’d be no withdrawal to get through.

I put Stripe and Spot back into their cage, and topped up their dry food. They watched me pace around the living room, checking my phone as if I’d somehow not heard it in the silent apartment. I waited.

And waited.

Until I heard the door creak open, slowly, like he thought I might have been sleeping. I raced to the door, then paused, composing myself. The first thing I looked at were his eyes, still dulled. He was pink from being out in the cold, and he was shivering as he shut the door behind him. A thousand things I wanted to ask him flooded my mind but I shoved them all down. He looked exhausted, so rather than bury him in questions, I slowly moved towards him and put my arms around his shoulders. All tension disappeared as he lifted his arms to hold me.

“I’m still mad at you,” he mumbled into my shoulder.

“Good, fine. Just be mad at me here, _with_ me.”

We stood still for a moment, just being safe together. I stepped back to look at him properly. He didn’t look like he’d just taken meth.

“So…?” I asked carefully.

“I, uh, don’t know how to get drugs,” he said with a humourless laugh. “Where do you -ngh- get meth anyway?”

I rested my forehead against his, letting my eyes fall shut.

“I’m sorry. I know that would have helped.”

He shrugged. Or maybe twitched, I’m not always sure.

“Not really. Can we just go to bed?”

 We lay in bed, with his back pressed against my chest, my arms around him, our hands linked.

“Are we going to be okay?” he asked quietly, into the dark.

“Yes. We are. You’re going to be fine too.”

“What if I can’t -ngh- kick this?”

“You will.”

I’m relieved. I’m honestly so relieved my boyfriend is so sweet and naïve that he doesn’t know where to find meth even when he wanted it so badly. I’d had thoughts of him catching a Greyhound, or even hitchhiking back to South Park where we know there must be some. It would have been a short-term cure though, he’d have had to get clean sooner or later. I wouldn’t have let him keep up a habit for any longer than he already had. I’d prepared myself for a best-case scenario of him coming home high, but in one piece. It never occurred to me that he might not even be able to source any. I squeezed him and he squeezed back, pressing a kiss to my fingers. I silently promised him I would do better. I wouldn’t let him down through this.

Somehow, things had to be fine at the end of this. For Tweek, they had to be.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Only one more after this!

Tweek slept solidly, like I’d never seen before. I kept waking up to check he was still there, checking he was okay, checking he was still breathing soundly beside me. I padded into the living room at eight, on far too little sleep to make a phone call to Tweek’s work, apologising for his absence. I lied smoothly about a bad bout of food poisoning that had him in hospital, but promised he would call them later in the day. I called the college to excuse myself for the past few days, and the lecture I would be missing today, feigning my own illness. I crawled back to bed and slept restlessly for a few more hours, plagued by dreams of losing Tweek to oily black monsters, until I was woken, sticking to the sheets. I peeled myself out to get a shower, only to realise it wasn’t me sweating, but Tweek. His face was red and shiny, his breathing laboured. I pushed back the thick blankets to his waist and woke him up. The sheets were soaked.

“Wasmatter…” he mumbled, grabbing for the blankets out of habit. “Oh fuck, my head…”

“Wake up, honey. I’ll get you some water and painkillers.”

“Coffee,” he said. Then woke up sharply. “No coffee.”

“No coffee.”

I brought him a glass of cold water and some painkillers, and handed them to him, and reminded him to take his other meds. He wasn’t sure he should still be taking them, but I insisted he try them until he saw Dr. Ramir for a review the following month. He shrugged and swallowed the handful of pills. I watched him half-walk, half-stumble to the bathroom to take a shower, and I quickly pulled all the sheets off the bed, dumping them in the kitchen to wash, and remade with dry sheets. On a quick internet search, I found that sweats weren’t meant to be one of the symptoms of withdrawal. Not of meth anyway, but I wasn’t going to start prying to see if there was something else nasty in his system. One drug was enough to deal with. On a second thought, I quickly checked other symptoms so I would know if there was anything amiss with his recovery. Heroin yielded severe flu symptoms and the sweats, along with the aches and pains he already had. He’d have recovered from things like ecstasy and cocaine. He’d always had a high body temperature, wearing shirts and no jackets a lot of the time in Colorado’s snow, when we were all bundled up in coats and hats. He came back into the bedroom with a towel around his waist, promptly dropped it and climbed into the clean bed with damp hair, pulling the sheets up around him. I folded the top, warm comforter down.

“You’re overheating in this,” I explained. He nodded and turned onto his side, closing his eyes.

A few hours later I topped up his water and put more codeine on his bedside table. We were running low, but I wasn’t planning to get more. The box warned that codeine was addictive and I wasn’t about to trade one for another, especially remembering how he used to drink Robitussin by the bottle as a kid. He could switch to paracetamol after the box was empty. I put my hand on his forehead to find him hot again, but not as bad as before with the sheets folded down.

The next few days passed in a similar way, he slept off a lot of days. He called work as promised, every day to check in until they told him he had to go back in or he was at risk of losing the job he’d only been in a matter of weeks. They’d given him a few days to recover from his ‘food poisoning’, but he was forced one morning to get up and shower in preparation for his 11am shift. They were happy to give him a few shorter shifts, but soon he’d be back up to his full days. He swallowed two paracetamol with his morning meds and got dressed, looking bleary-eyed and completely not ready to go to work.

“How’s your head today?”

“Easing up.” He twitched a little. “At least I haven’t got the stomach pains any more. I still don’t feel great though.”

“Will you be okay? Call if you want picked up.”

He nodded and buttoned his purple work shirt. He was still shaking but lined up the buttons okay on his third try. I guess some things would still be the same. I was going back to college that day too. I’d said I had food poisoning too, it seemed plausible if anyone asked – I’m a horrible cook, after all. A solid dose of salmonella in some undercooked chicken by two students out on their own for the first time was not unlikely. I had missed an Art History lecture, a work tutorial and one of the Art In Cinema films, but I had watched it on my own while Tweek was sleeping, and written my report on it. I downloaded the slides from the History lecture and researched the related artists in my own time, so hopefully my tutors couldn’t be too mad. My high school teachers would be fuming if they could see me now and how hard I was working. I was one of the real slackers in the school, routinely skipping classes to hang out in the art room. The art teacher used to roll her eyes and tell me to get back to class, but without any real force because I was better in there that smoking out back with the other burnouts. At least I was working. I did okay in Math and English, and that’s all the college really wanted other than a really solid portfolio. When I was approaching my college interview date, my art teacher spent several hours going through it all with me, making sure I was using my best drawings and having me retake photos of my sculptures over and over to get the best angles. She was the only teacher I gave a gift to at the end of the year. Some of the others got a mumbled ‘thanks’, and certain ones got nothing but a middle finger. However, now I was in college, that I’d worked hard to get into, I was planning on putting in my best. After all, there was no second chances this time, no resitting years, not that I’d ever had to do that. It cost too much to screw up, and even though I had no idea what I was going to do when college was over, probably end up working a basic-ass job for pennies, but I planned to make the years I’d be at college really count, even if I had to work part time soon. I wanted a job as soon as possible, so my parents didn’t have to keep giving me money they didn’t have. They put up with a lot of shit from me over my teenage years, honestly, I was a shit. I was routinely grounded and I only kept my behaviour in check because I wasn’t allowed to see Tweek when I was in trouble. I managed to get through high school, and get out here. I tried to see the situation we were in as a hiccup, a bend in the road, rather than a long-term problem. Tweek seemed to be getting better by the day, although his mental state wasn’t much improving. He was slightly less paranoid, but he said he was still seeing things, and hearing voices. He was unhappy. Not wanting to think about his dopamine, and the anhedonia that could be persistent for years to come, I was thinking he’d feel better in a week or two when he was sleeping less and the meth was properly out of his system.

On my own, with days to fill while Tweek was sleeping, I stewed over Tweek’s parents. He hadn’t felt like talking, trying to get as much sleep as he could, as if he was making up for a lifetime of insomnia, which I guess he kind of was. I didn’t want to bring it up with him, not wanting to touch on a sore spot so soon, but I knew he must have been thinking about it. His brain is always running a million miles an hour, and I wondered if he was sleeping, at least in part, so he didn’t have to think.

Tweek was on the sofa when I got home from college. He’d changed out of his uniform and was asleep. I put a fleece over him, but he woke up. 

“You’re home,” he said quietly, lifting his arms for a hug. I kissed him hello and he sat up, rubbing his face. “Can we -ngh- talk?”

We could talk. Talking was safe. Talking was fine.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go! The last one! I hope this concludes satisfactorily :)

We spent the whole evening talking. We hadn’t talked that much in the past week combined. We talked until Tweek started yawning, his eyes heavy. He told me about his day at work, which had been exhausting, but it had felt good to get out of the house. He told me how he was feeling, he told me how he felt hopeless and useless. He cried and said sorry over and over, and I wiped away his tears and told him, as fiercely as my flat voice would allow, that he never, ever had to apologise for this. He never had to be sorry for how he felt. He talked, bitterly, about his parents and how he never wanted to see them again. He’d never gotten on well with his parents and their dopey ignorance to anything going on in his life. They only seemed to be bothered about him if he was late to work. He told me they’d tried to talk him into staying, but only because they didn’t want to pay a real wage to a new employee. He didn’t miss them at all, and now they’d destroyed his trust, he hated them with venom. He said, again, he never wanted to go back to South Park, but when I gently explained I would be seeing my parents over the holidays, he begrudgingly said he’d like to visit with me, as long as his parents didn’t know he was in town, and we would go nowhere near the coffee shop. I promised him that, because I wouldn’t be able to be tried as a minor when I tore them to pieces. Tweek had looked alarmed but still laughed, which meant he wouldn’t like me going to prison but appreciated my anger. He was angry too, much more than me, rightfully so.

He was still a little angry at me too. I apologised and he kissed my face. It was a shitty move on my part, I shouldn’t have done it, or at least, how I did it. He understood that I didn’t believe him. He laughed dryly and said he probably wouldn’t have believed me either, with the evidence what it was.

Together we lamented his damaged brain and body. We talked about getting him properly checked out when we could afford it, and remembered he needed to register at a dentist, and again, when we had some money get him some proper dental work. We talked about which things seemed to be improving without the drug in his system, he was so much less jerky in his movements, but he still had some twitches and shook and had tics in his voice. We agreed some things would be permanent. He asked me if I’d still love him if he never got normal, with a shaking voice, like there was ever a chance I’d say no. I swore to us both I’d love him forever and always. I meant it. I wanted a life with Tweek, my whole life. People have asked me if I ever crushed on anyone else, or lamented the fact that I’d been with one person since I was forced into a relationship by a whole town at ten years old. I didn’t understand. I had Tweek, who else could compare?

He asked me how I was feeling and I realised I hadn’t taken enough time to think about that. I didn’t think I had a right to feel anything but angry and worried. I told him how scared I’d been and he was surprised, having never known me be scared of anything. I was happy we knew about it though. I felt guilty about that, though Tweek agreed it was better to have known. I was tired, it had been a huge stress on me too. I hadn’t realised how much the past week had taken out of me. Sometimes it felt like a whole lifetime, when really it was a matter of days.

Then he surprised me.

“I should sue.”

I was stunned for a moment but then remembered my promise. I was there for Tweek.

“Okay.”

We spent a little while on our phones researching the difference between a lawyer and a solicitor, chatting about which ones were best for teenagers, which were best for drugs, which were best for families. We made some notes, or rather, I did, because Tweek writes like a spider dipped in ink. We found some numbers to call, for solicitors that offered a free thirty-minute phone consultation, before we took the case any further. We needed to know if it was worth claiming, but first, we had to obtain some proof. I called Tweek’s parents, in the bedroom, because he couldn’t stand to even hear his dad’s mind-numbing tone, let alone speak to him himself. I asked him to send across a bag of Sunrise Blend, as we’d ran out, and Tweek was suffering without it. I went on to explain his concentration was shot and he needed a fix of the good stuff. He agreed that it had been helpful through school, and said he’d send out a package in the morning. I hung up without saying goodbye _or_ threatening to murder him in his stupid coffee shop. Tweek was tense when I came back in, but I promised I wouldn’t keep it in the house. It would arrive in the next few days and I would stash it… somewhere. I suggested my school locker but Tweek panicked, pointing out if anyone checked they’d find drugs in my drawer and then I’d be ruined. They wouldn’t, they’d find a bag of coffee, but the point still stood.

We slept after that, and I made it to college the next day by 11am, and spent the day there. I was making an sculpture about moving from South Park to our new place, but I had to spend a good hour in the afternoon making notes and ideas about my next installation about Tweek. Since I met him I’ve been drawing him, photographing him, but I’d never worked out how to make something big enough as a tribute. Now I had this studio space, I’d be making an installation dedicated to him, and I’d bring him into the college when it was done and show him. I was excited to share my new work with him, after all the lunch breaks and free classes we had together in the art room, watching me make a mess.

Tweek’s health only improved as the days went on, he was tired without the constant coffee, but now with a deep distrust of caffeine, he threw out his pills and nice filter coffee, leaving only a sealed jar of instant coffee if we had guests. Not that we did. We made plans with Token, Clyde and Jimmy to see them over the approaching Christmas break, back in South Park, where we’d stay with my parents. We had moved too far apart to really visit each other, but we made efforts to have video chat. I did end up making friends with a couple of people on my course. Maybe _friends_ is a strong word, but in-class acquaintances. Ultimately, it was okay to have someone to sit with during lectures, and to complain about the shitty old films we had to write about in Art In Cinema, but we hadn’t had anyone over to the apartment. Tweek was, amazingly, planning to go to a work night out, but only after he checked that I could go with him. In his recovering health, he started to pick up more hours.

Some days he struggled to get out of bed. Some nights he cried for hours. He had his anti-psychotic and anti-depressant both increased, and we confided in Dr. Ramir about what had happened. He listened patiently and pushed forward Tweek’s referral for a therapist, flagging it as _urgent_. On a higher dose, Tweek’s psychosis started to settle, and his mood steadied out, although he was not as happy as he used to be. I missed his beautiful smile a lot of the time, but he was trying his best for me, and I couldn’t ask for more than that.

The solicitor said we had a good, solid case with Tweek’s hospital report and the bag of coffee, which we had tested and handed over to the police. It was laced with methamphetamine, just as promised. With us being out of Colorado, the police weren’t able to do anything about the drugs, simply accept the anonymous bag, label ripped off. We didn’t especially want the police involved too soon. The case went slowly, we hired a lawyer in our corner, on a flat-rate cost. We knew we hadn’t hired the best people, but we simply couldn’t afford to do more than a no-win, no-fee basis. The process went way too fucking slowly, especially when we agreed that what we wanted was enough to cover the hospital bills that we’d get for Tweek to get a full check-up and dental work, and anything else would go into our savings.

Of course, that meant we had to take out our own insurance, as Tweek wouldn’t be covered by his parents’ after he effectively disowned them, which was just another adult thing we had to sort out. I took the lead on most of this, this time, Tweek was simply too tired to deal with a lot of it, so he nominated me to deal with it all on his behalf. He mostly sat quietly, almost still, in the lawyer’s office while I talked deals and plans. The first court date was approaching and we didn’t hear from Tweek’s parents after the process started. We were both dreading having to see Tweek's parents in court, but we'd deal with that as it came.

“How are you feeling?” I asked, as we lay in bed one morning, curled up warm and safe together.

“I’m okay, actually. I’m really starting to feel better.”

“Yeah? Are you sure?”

He looked at me, a soft smile on his face in the warm light and nodded. He looked serene, peaceful, and I believed him. I would try my best to never doubt him again. Tweek doesn’t lie to me. I should have known that sooner.

Everything was fine, and I had a feeling it was going to stay that way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I've done basically nothing else this week other than writing this, but I really got into it. I hope you've enjoyed it, and your comments have been so much appreciated <3 
> 
> Thank you for reading, and I'll hopefully see you again!


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